Favorite Things Christmas Weekend

Jen flew into town from Montana for our annual girls' Christmas party. It was like she never left. We decided to pack as much as we could into Gentle B's visit. Friday night we hit up Daniel's for happy hour then headed to get mani's & pedi's. Saturday we shopped downtown, walked through the market, and had a delicious lunch at Snackbar.

Rain will not ruin our shopping




Andrea & Nicki had never been to the gum wall. Gross. Not sure why I'm standing awkwardly far away from Jen in this photo.


Jen found her brick at the market




One of my favorite parts of the holidays is the annual "Favorite Things" Christmas party with my girls. Thank you, Oprah, for your inspiration. Though we didn't get a new car or cruise, I'm pretty sure we had more fun the big O's audience. Everyone picks their favorite thing (or things) from the year and buys them for the other four in our group. Past gifts have been all over the map: eyeliner, underwear, magazine subscription, booze, a veggie peeler, salad dressing...you never know what you are going to get.

This is the fourth year of this party. Though technically we did switch it up and go white elephant in year two (I just recently donated my mechanical kitty cat to goodwill), we went back to favorite things in year 3. Oh my how this party has changed. In 2007 we did a progressive dinner with the guys. Each gal hosted the group for a course, a cocktail, and her gift at her home. Nicole started us off with a martini the size of a fishbowl and it was all down hill from there. It really wasn't pretty. I chose the comfort of Andrea's couch over actually making it to our last stop and I'm pretty sure her tree hasn't recovered from Nicki falling into it and knocking it over. Fast forward to 2010. Things have mellowed a bit. We ditched the boys for a ladies only night. Our plan to spread the gift opening throughout the night was quickly derailed and all the presents were open within about 10 minutes of our arrival. After a delicious dinner and some whipped cream vodka cocktails we got crazy... with over 3 hours of Scattegories. Funnest. Game. Ever. We quoted Christmas Vacation while it played in the background 2 1/2 times. We formed an alliance against Nicki when she pulled into the lead. We laughed until we cried. At one point Andrea suggested a shot. We all groaned and moved onto the next round of Scattegories. We took a cab home as planned at 1 am even though we were pretty sober. We woke up Sunday morning without a hangover. We decided getting older isn't so bad.

Andrea and Nicki cooking dinner. I'm still not sure why Andrea was cooking on a stool.




Nicki's favorite things: beautiful tea towels from Etsy. We each got a different set.


Nicole's favorite things: Lavendar warming wrap & kitchen towel


Andrea's favorite things: Kiehl's goodies & eggplant ornament


Jenny's favorite things: Candle, lip balm, lotion


My favorite things: slippers & Tony's creole seasoning


Scattegories is cool


It's not a party until Nicki falls asleep on the couch


Looking forward to 2011. Love you girls!